What Day Is the Sabbath?

The first Christians worshipped on the seventh day of the week, but now most churches worship on the first day. How did the day change? Does God care which day you keep?

Is one day of the week holy? If one day is holy, which day is it? Most Christians believe Sunday is the day for rest, but some churches rest on Saturday. Who is right? Is one of those days holy now?

The Bible says that God created a weekly day of rest when He made the earth. “And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done” (Genesis 2:3, NIV). In the beginning God made the seventh day a holy day for rest—a day which the Bible calls the Sabbath.

More than 2,500 years later, God made an agreement with the Israelites, and He gave them the Ten Commandments. One of the commandments is that everyone must rest on the seventh day:

“Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you. For in six days the Lord made all the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy” (Exodus 20:8-11, NASB).

The Ten Commandments were not new laws! The Sabbath was not a new law. God reminded the people that He had made the Sabbath holy when He made the earth.

Many people think that people who lived before the Israelites, like Abraham, did not know about the Sabbath and God’s other laws. But the Bible clearly says that God made the Sabbath holy at the beginning, long before Abraham was born. God also said, “Abraham obeyed me and kept my requirements, my commands, my decrees and my laws” (Genesis 26:5, NIV). When God talked to the Israelites He said, “remember the Sabbath.” They already knew about the Sabbath—probably from their forefather Abraham.

The seventh day in the Bible is the 24 hours between sunset on Friday and sunset on Saturday. Some calendars show Sunday as the last day of the week—but Saturday is the seventh day in the Bible.

Did Christ change the Sabbath?

Many Christians believe that Christ abolished the Sabbath, so Christians can choose any day to worship. Other Christians believe that now the first day—Sunday—is holy. Did Christ abolish or change the Sabbath?

Many people believe that when Jesus died, He abolished God’s laws, including the Sabbath. But Jesus taught,

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:17-19, NIV).

Jesus taught that everyone must obey the same laws that God taught to Abraham and the Israelites.

Jesus also never changed the Sabbath to another day. Jesus always kept the Sabbath on the seventh day. For example, Luke 4:16 says, “So He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read.” After that “He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and was teaching them on the Sabbaths” (verse 31). Jesus always went to the temple or a synagogue on the same day as the Jews.

Some of the religious teachers said that Jesus did not keep the Sabbath because He healed people on the Sabbath. Jesus criticized them because they did not know how to keep the Sabbath properly. He asked, “What if one of you has a sheep and it falls into a deep hole on the Sabbath? Will you not take hold of it and lift it out? And a human being is worth much more than a sheep! So then, our Law does allow us to help someone on the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:11, 12, GNT). Jesus never abolished or changed the Sabbath. He taught people the right way to keep it.

Which day did Christ’s followers keep?

After Jesus died, His followers continued to obey the commandment to rest on the seventh day: “Now the women who had come with Him out of Galilee followed after, and saw the tomb and how His body was laid. And they returned and prepared spices and perfumes. And on the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment” (Luke 23:55, 56, NASB). For many years the Christians continued to keep the Sabbath on the same day as the Jews.

The apostle Paul always kept the Sabbath. In the city of Corinth, Paul “held discussions in the synagogue every Sabbath, trying to convince both Jews and Greeks” (Acts 18:4, GNT). Paul kept the Sabbath in every place that he went. For more examples, read Acts 13:14, 42, 44; Acts 16:13; and Acts 17:2. Some people believe that Paul taught that people only need faith, and do not need to keep the Sabbath. This is not true. Paul said, “Does this mean that by this faith we do away with the Law? No, not at all; instead, we uphold the Law” (Romans 3:31, GNT; Also read Romans 2:13; 7:12). Paul taught people to obey God’s law.

Some Christians try to find support in the Bible for their tradition of meeting on Sunday. Many Christians say that 1 Corinthians 16:2 shows that the early Christians met together on Sunday. But this verse says nothing about a church meeting! Paul told the people in Corinth to save something each Sunday to send to the people in Judea because there was a famine in Judea. Paul did not say anything about meeting or resting on Sunday. The people in Corinth met on Saturday, not Sunday (Acts 18:1-11).

Other people say that in Acts 20:7 the people met for church on Sunday. The verse says, “Now on the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread, Paul, ready to depart the next day, spoke to them and continued his message until midnight.” This was not a church service. The people came to eat a meal. To “break bread” means to eat a normal meal (see Luke 24:30; Acts 27:35; Lamentations 4:4). Notice that this meal and Paul’s speaking were at night (Acts 20:7, 8, 11). In the Bible, every day begins at sunset—so the dark portion of “the first day” is Saturday night. This was not a Sunday church service. Paul and the disciples ate and talked on Saturday night. The next morning, on Sunday, Paul did not rest. He walked about 20 miles (32 kilometers) to the city of Assos (verses 13, 14). Paul always kept the Sabbath on Saturday. On Sunday he worked. The Bible does not have any command to keep Sunday holy, and the Bible does not have any examples of anyone ever keeping Sunday.

Who changed God’s day of rest?

After the early followers of Christ died, humans changed the day of rest from Saturday to Sunday. Many Christians wanted to be different from the Jews and began to meet on Sunday instead of Saturday. In 135AD (about one hundred years after Christ died) the Roman ruler Hadrian outlawed the Sabbath and the Jewish religion. The Roman government killed many people who kept the Sabbath. After that time most Christians did not keep the seventh day anymore. In about 155AD, the Christian teacher Justin Martyr wrote, “Sunday is the day on which we all hold our common assembly, because it is the first day on which God…made the world” (First Apology, chapter 67). Most Christians today still follow the tradition of meeting on the first day of the week.

A few Christians have always continued to obey God’s laws and keep the seventh-day Sabbath. However, Christians who obey God’s laws often suffer persecution. In 365AD, at the Council of Laodicea, the Catholic Church decreed: “Christians must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honoring the Lord’s Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians” (Canon 29). Notice that some Christians were still keeping the Sabbath 300 years after Christ died!

When Jesus was on earth, He told the religious leaders, “All too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition” (Mark 7:9). Today, most Christians also reject God’s commandments and follow their own traditions. Jesus knew that there would be many who say that they follow Him, but who do not obey God’s laws. He said, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). God will reward those who believe and obey Him.

God never changed the Sabbath. Humans chose another day of rest. But humans can’t make a day holy. God chose the seventh day and made it holy. He never made the first day holy. The true Sabbath is still from sunset on Friday to sunset on Saturday.

Why did God command everyone to rest on the seventh day? Why is the Sabbath one of the Ten Commandments? One reason God created the Sabbath is because He wants to have a good relationship with the people He created. On the Sabbath we are free from work, so we have time to improve our relationship with God. God commands us to meet together on the Sabbath with other people who obey God, so we can learn about God and encourage each other (see Leviticus 23:3 and Hebrews 10:25). God also created the seventh-day Sabbath to be a sign to show who His people are (Exodus 31:13).

The Sabbath gives everyone the rest that they need from their work. This time of rest at the end of every week teaches us about the end time when Jesus Christ will bring peace to the earth for a thousand years (Hebrews 4:1-11; Revelation 20:4-6). During that time everyone will keep the true Sabbath: “‘It shall come to pass that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before Me,’ says the Lord” (Isaiah 66:23).

God made the seventh day holy. The true Sabbath has never changed. God tells us to “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” (Exodus 20:8). What will you do? Will you keep the day that God has chosen?

Scriptures in this article were quoted from the New King James Version unless noted as follows: GNT (Good News Translation), NASB (New American Standard Bible), NIV (New International Version).

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